Xander arches a dark brow. “Have you met said king?”
I force a grin at that, though it dwindles in the wind as I look back out over the water.
“So,” Xander says, breaking the silence, “how are you doing? Really?”
“Fine,” I answer, swallowing down the other words that attempt to follow in opposition. “Everything is fine.”
“Has anyone ever told you you’re a shit liar?”
I scoff, tightening my fingers over the cold metal railing. “That’s rude.”
Xander offers a barely perceptible shrug of one shoulder. “Doesn’t make it any less true,” he teases, his lips just briefly quirking before his voice grows serious again. “Eve is…concernedabout you. Because of what’s happened.”
My chin drops to my chest, an invisible noose tightening around my throat. “The beach?”
“Amongst other things. I am limited inhowI can help you, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t or won’t. I know you don’t trust me fully—and I’d honestly be disappointed if you did—but I can promise you that I mean it when I say I want you away from the king and back with the mage prince.”
“You can say his name,” I assert, though my voice comes out haggard. I turn my head to see Xander’s gaze already on me, a question lingering there. “No one ever says it, and I just—” My words choke off under a stilted breath. It’s a silly thing, really, to care that they always refer to him like some mysterious entity. One shrouded by the lies and secrets he wore to keep himself safe as he tried to find the source of the magic. As he tried to findme. But when was the last time I heard his name spoken outside of the confines of my own mind? “He is real,” I say, more to myself.
“He is,” Xander affirms, leaning in a little closer. “I’m hoping that once I can check in with my men in Vitour, I’ll have some more information to give you regarding him.”
“Is Stephan the one giving you that information?”
“Some of it,” he answers honestly. “The rest is from a collection of small towns that border the Mage Kingdom. I’ve found that having multiple sources produces the most accurate information.”
I nod right as a wave crashes into the ship, momentarily knocking me off balance. I hit my hip against the railing as the ship evens out and grunt at the bite of pain that licks around thebrand. “Gods,” I hiss, squeezing my eyes shut while I breathe through the lingering soreness.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I bite out as I lay my hand gently over my hip as if that alone will soothe the ache there. “It’s nothing.”
Xander looks unconvinced but thankfully doesn’t press the issue. He does, unfortunately, bring up a different one. “We need to talk about what happened yesterday.”
“Which part?”
His brows furrow again as he looks out over the deck. “Youhealedsirens,” he says with a hint of incredulity. “What else could have happened that was more noteworthy than that?”
Right. Because Xander doesn’t know about Simon and the torture and the way I told King Dolian I would always hate him. All of those things had inexplicably happened in a single day, yet it feels as if a part of me has been stuck in each of those moments simultaneously for weeks.
“I didn’t know my magic could do that. I truly thought they were going to die.”
“I gathered as much,” he says gently, and that knot in my throat grows bigger. “But I do think you need to be aware that now that the king knows what you can do, he’s going to figure out a way to use it to his own advantage, especially if it means regaining the upper hand from Queen Amari.”
I flex my fingers over my hip. I hadn’t even considered how I might be used in this way. “If I can heal the sirens…”
“Then it stands to reason that your magic will work onanybeing,” Xander finishes for me as he pushes up from the railing. “You’ve just become Olymazi’s greatest weapon.”
Or its downfall.
“I have a system back in Vitour. More men I trust, more ways to gather information securely. Our options will be greater. We just need to survive whatever His Majesty has planned nextuntil we can get you free of his hold.” His use of the word “we” makes my heart thump strangely. Does he truly think of us as a team? At my nod, he takes a step, making to walk away before pausing. “Eve is a good one,” he blurts, almost as if he hadn’t quite planned on those words spilling out.
“What?”
“Person. She’s a good person. If you need someone to…talkto about things, you can trust her.”
“Says the male with the same scar on his palm that she has.”
His eyes meet mine then, both of us looking over our shoulders at the other. There’s no judgement in his, and I watch as he deliberately unmasks his expression layer by layer, letting me see his sincerity. “Our imprisonment may not have been as literal as yours was andis, Lady Rhea, but it doesn’t make it any less real. It doesn’t mean we are not still unwilling participants in all of this.”
